Talk:Deponent verb

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I can think of verbs that are used far more commonly in their passive forms. You hear about being accustomed often, but how often do you hear about accustoming? Not very. If you try to make "I am pooped" active, you change its meaning; the same thing with "I am pissed", although you can say, "that pisses me off". LOL! Personally, I don't use "This tires me" at all, but very often I say, "I'm tired and I need to go to bed". You can say, "I am used to it", but not, "he uses me to it". English does some funny stuff with the passive voice, and no one has noticed. Also, we make up funny adjectives like "four-legged", which derives from an unused verb meaning to attach four legs to, lol; compare that with the Latin "togatus", toga-clad. --jasonc65

I think "tired and pooped" are past-participle adjectives. "Used to" seems to be a defective verb in that sense(?), only used in the past tense and as a past participle adjective. About -legged, -fabled etc, I think you are wrong in thinking there *must* be a verb, and that the adjective could be derived directly from a noun. (Gee, such bad explanation, I am such an amateur on this.)惑乱 分からん 13:55, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Nugor. Sed pauca verba certe videtur deponentia, nonne consentis? There, I just used one. You're supposed to get used to it. Oops, there go two more. Never mind. Are we agreed? There we go again. Participle adjectives. Defective verbs that cannot be used in the active voice. Or should we just say, deponents? They say that looking at a language through the lens of another is dangerous. It is actually disputed that Greek contains deponents, being that they were really reflexive verbs misunderstood through Latin analogy. Actually, even Latin deponents are really left-overs from the middle voice. I do think it amusing to compare some of our verbs with Latin deponents, even if the similarity is misleading. The way we use passive-looking verbs like "to be tired" and defective verbs like "is supposed to" and idioms like "we are agreed" in ways that are quasi-reflexive, quasi-passive, quasi-middle, is in fact similar to Latin deponents like "irascor", "conor", "opinor", reflexive German verbs like "sich erinnern", the Greek middle voice, and our own indigenous middle voice with verbs like "move", "burn", "stretch", etc. in the senses which are intransitive and involve self-propulsion of some sort. Also, in French, the passive meaning is often expressed through the reflexive voice. Reflexive verbs in French, therefore, are deponents. LOL. --jasonc65